Five Things You Should Advise Your Client to Do with That Defensively Registered Domain

As a trusted legal advisor, you have taken valiant measures to protect your client’s brand against evil cybersquatters, typo-squatters, domain tasters, and other nefarious enemies by defensively registering a domain. Your client has already spent money to buy the domain, so why not provide your client additional value by encouraging him or her to put the domain to work instead of letting it just gather dust in the registrar account?

Indeed, defensive registration of a new domain is an exciting opportunity for a brand to tell its story, and perhaps more importantly, to attempt something bold, innovative, and exciting. Here are five inexpensive and easy ways your client can utilize that new domain right now:

Use the domain for a microsite or micro campaign. You’ve got to admit that www.yourbrand.rockslooks great on a billboard – certainly much better than a QR code – and it sounds great on the radio. It’s just different enough to turn heads and to position your brand as savvy to emerging tech trends and developments.
Redirect the domain to a third-party social platform. Is your client’s brand on Facebook? YouTube? Periscope? If so, there’s a good chance that your client is getting lost in a lengthy and forgettable domain such as www.facebook.com/yourbrand or www.youtube.com/yourbrand. By redirecting www.yourbrand.social to your Facebook page, www.yourbrand.video to your YouTube page, and www.yourbrand.live to your client’s Periscope page, your client is providing customers and audience with a memorable and quality path to content that puts the brand front and center.
Use the domain to emphasize a page on the client’s website that’s not getting its fair share of attention. It can be challenging to direct an audience to a specific page of your client’s website, especially if the user has to navigate an extensive website menu in order to get there. By setting that new domain to redirect to a particular page in the website, your client is providing his or her audience with a clear and exciting path to that content, whether it’s www.yourbrand.family leading to a careers or company culture page or www.yourbrand.gives as a showcase for a corporate philanthropy page.
Use the domain to aggregate the client’s social media streams or track a particular hashtag. Whether your client’s brand is hosting a contest or giveaway or your client simply wants to make the most of the brand’s social network aggregation by sharing the feed with his or her audience, pointing a descriptive and unique domain at that feed is a great way to celebrate this content as a destination. For social media aggregation, domains like www.yourbrand.social and www.yourbrand.ninja are fantastic options.
Augment the client’s Search Engine Marketing (SEM) efforts. There are more websites and third-party content to compete with than ever before, meaning that getting found is half the battle. A recent study of the 100 most expensive keywords on Google revealed that the industry specificity of these searches happens to coincide with—and in many cases exactly match – these search terms. By redirecting a keyword-rich domain to your website, or by outright transitioning to a more keyword-rich domain, brands can significantly improve their search engine rankings even in the most competitive fields, like law. When personal injury attorney Eric S. Block realized he couldn’t match his competitors’ SEM spending, he decided to make the transition from www.ericblocklaw.com to www.jacksonville.attorney. Where the previous website had failed to rank at all for any relevant search terms, Eric Block’s new .attorney website ranks first for the search term “Jacksonville + Attorney.”

Your clients have already invested in a marvelous tool, so why not help them put that tool to use? Don’t let your clients’ money go to waste!

About the Author

Statton Hammock is responsible for guiding Rightside on business, legal, and policy matters related to its registry operations. Prior to joining Rightside, Statton spent five years with Network Solutions as Sr. Director of Law and Policy, where he provided legal and strategic business advice related to the protection of intellectual property rights, Internet governance, data security and privacy, and compliance with ICANN policies related to the provisioning, sale, and use of domain names.